Corridor 9

Once again, we have come to the close of another year. We have bid farewell to the pains and joys of the past year in our quest for the new horizon that lay ahead. God has definitely blessed our family, from my parents selling their house, to Kristie and I buying a house for ourself. We’ve all seen our bit of hardships, but we’ve definitely seen Gods hand throughout this entire year.

I can only hope that your past year has been as wonderful as ours, and hope that you share in our vision of an amazing 2007 filled with love, peace, and prosperity.

God Bless, and HaPpY NeW YeAr!!!

The time right now is 9:28, and the Butcher of Baghdad is officially dead. The information that is given by various news networks indicates that Hussein’s death by hanging was extremely symbolic and carried out at 6:50 am Iraqi time. His wishes to be shot were not granted, and he was treated to exactly the death he was due; largely in part to the fact that he thought hanging was demeaning and for lesser people. Apparently there was video shot of his execution, but this video was shot by Iraqis and may not be available to the general public at all. My theory is that this video will appear on YouTube within 2 days, but I’m not going to place any bets as Steve Irwin’s death has yet to make its rounds on the net.

While this information comes with great applause to those who are seeking justice for the many crimes that Saddam has engaged in, it also comes with a bittersweet warning for United States citizens. Threats by the Baath party have been verified through an internet posting stating that retaliation against U.S. interests is certain after Saddam’s death.

May the families of those affected by Saddam Hussein’s rein of terror be eased by his execution, and may the rest of the world be prepared for the backlash that is sure to follow.

Hmm… seems to me I was just trying to educate you all on the effects of global warming a few days ago. It’s amazing that I hear today on ABC news that another large ice shelf broke apart in the arctic this time.

“The breakup was so powerful, earthquake monitors 250 kilometers away picked up the tremors”

Apparently the ice shelf broke up more than 16 months ago, but is just now being reported on after scientists take time to piece together the information. Approximately 41 square miles of ice shelf 3000 to 4500 years old and 121 ft. thick dropped into the ocean.

It’s time to do something people, and it’s time to do something NOW!
Read the rest of the story on Canada’s National Post

You may remember reading about the firefighter I know with who had a loss in the family due to cancer. Unfortunately, this same fire fighter’s wife has been diagnosed with cancer also. Because he is quiet and reserved about family matters, no other information was given. Please pray for him and his family, and remember how important your own family is.

Ok, so I’m sitting here, thinking about my trip, wishing the time would go faster, and feeling miserable because it doesn’t seem to be working when I stumble across a subject that I’ve thought about so many times before. How do you get a good meal when you’re miles away from civilization?

Well, Gadling.com has just posted about Camping Recipes and a new place for hikers and backpackers to exchange recipe information.

CampRecipes.com was created in 2000 and currently has approximately 550 recipes in their database. After browsing through their database for a few minutes, I think I’m going to try a few new recipes on the upcoming trip. I’m really getting tired of oatmeal, noodles, and rice. There is even a category for Emergency Survival Food recipes. The Mashed Cattail looks fairly good.

I’ve also found a nice Five Minute Bread Recipe from Scoutmaster’s blog that looks like it would be a nice breakfast one day. I figure I can try it out at home and cut back the recipe as needed for 2 people.

Earlier last week I was shopping around Wal-Mart trying to find a DVD that Kristie wanted for Christmas when something caught my eye. Normally this time of year manufacturers are highly focused on their packaging, always trying to make their product look better and thus increase sales and profit. However, a DVD caught my eye simply based on its packaging. No fancy plastic case, no shiny display, just a simple printed cardboard packaging with a DVD inside.

An Inconvenient Truth: A Global Warning is a movie about the rising carbon dioxide levels in our atmosphere and the effect it has on global warming. It was narrated by Al Gore and documents both his attempts, as well as others, to educate the world about global warming and the dangers that are only decades away if we continue along the same path of denial that has clouded our way so far.

As pictures convey a thousand words, one of the pictures that caught my eye in the movie was with regards to the Larsen B Ice Shelf. Between January 31 to March 05, 2002 the Ice Shelf in Antarctica lost approximately 3250 km² of ice 200 m thick broke off, essentially disintegrating into the sea due to global warming. This is an area roughly the size of Rhode Island.

Now… let me clear up a few facts. First, I was astonished by how professional this movie was. It wasn’t simply thrown together, but has a great deal of scientific data to back up every point put forth in the movie. It also addresses the fact that almost every scientific journal and paper signifies the existence of global warming as a fact, not merely a theory as discussed in the mainstream media. No matter what your feeling for Al Gore are, no matter what your feeling are on global warming, and no matter what your feelings are about my ranting this is simply a must watch movie that will open your eyes with so much scientific data that it will simply be impossible to ignore this Inconvenient Truth any more.

The Family Christmas Picture with The Buskovs, The Edingtons, The Bohannons, and The LeBuhns. May God Be with us all throughout the upcoming year, and may God be with your family as well.

I’ve made it a lot easier for people to add me to their home pages via the subscribe box on the left hand side. This will allow you to add a “feed” to your page just like you might get from MSN, The Wallstreet Journal, or Gizmodo.

In a discussion we are having on Kampfire, a “catch-all” discussion group that we BGTers use to keep our editors from yelling at us for posting irrelevant information in the wrong group, people were talking about Jesus and the Law of Moses. As part of the discussion I posted a link to the group that

“Elaborates a bit more clearly and in depth than I can on Jesus and the Low of Moses.”

Needless to say, with all the editors that frequent Kampfire, someone picked up on the “Low” part and responded

“Moses was depressed?”

And of course, someone else hopped on that bandwagon too. Heres the response that was too funny not to post here.

“Are you kidding? Think about it. You grow up as a Prince of Egypt. Life is good.

Then God shows up and tells Moses that he’s going to go on a backpacking trip with 500,000 Jews. If that’s not enough to give a man a seizure, these Jews turn out to be miserable, complaining, ungrateful whiners. The good news is that after the backpacking trip, they would enter the Promised Land and everything would be good.

Maybe Moses thought that a nice backpacking trip would be OK, and the Promised Land sounds nice, but then this backpacking trip LASTS 40 YEARS WITH 500,000 JEWS BREATHING DOWN HIS NECK THE WHOLE TIME!

Then, at the end of it, God takes Moses up to a high mountain and says, “Hey, Moses, you see all that? That’s the Promised Land! That’s what you’ve been dragging my Chosen People around for 40 years for, and THAT, my friend, is the reward.”

“Well, THANK GOD!”

“You’re welcome. One small catch. You can’t go there. Neither can anyone who was alive when you left Egypt. Real sorry about that and all, but I’m God, so there. Ha-Ha!”

You’d be depressed too.”

After doing a reinstall to make the server faster, I realized that the pictures in the gallery have not been correctly resized. Because it takes to long to dynamically resize the pictures when people first view them, I’ve decided to resize all the pictures at once. This was done on the last install, but fixing problems has its price.

So, for the next day you will notice extremely slow speeds when connecting to Corridor9.net. Please be patient as I am working to make the site better for all.

In addition, I’m pruning Gallery to get rid of some pictures that are hardly accessed. I’m hoping that this will further increase the speed of C9. While these pictures will no longer be available online, I will still have a master copy stored offline in case people need access to them for some reason.

EDIT: All work should be completed.

I’ve always wanted a Mac notebook, but when I bought my Dell Inspiron 8500, I was wary about purchasing a Mac because I didn’t think I would be able to run the software I commonly use. Now that Mac is based off a unix style operating system, but still runs an an x86 architecture, I going to have to do some serious soul searching about whether to get the a Mac or the XPS described below.

Purchasing decisions aside, I’ve grown to love the new Mac vs. PC ads. They are so simple, yet have so much content and humor built in. Thanks Apple!

Normally this time of the year people are counting the days to Christmas; a few might even be counting the days to the new year. Rarely is it the case that someone is counting the days to a long grueling hike on top of a wind blown ridge with nothing but a cold weather sleeping bag for warmth. However, for those of us who are addicted to the crisp clean open air of the mountains, these 24 days are sure to be a miserable waiting experience.

In light of the Mt. Hood incident I’ve decided to rent a SatPhone. Although the trip I’m going on will have absolutely no technical climbing involved like those involved in Mt. Hood, the fact that my wife worries about my survival when I’m away is reason enough for me to rent one. I’d rather have a Personal Locator Beacon, but since I’ll be traveling with another companion a Satellite Phone will work just as well, and will offer us the opportunity to call the wives to let them know we’re alive.

I’ll be buying a PLB later on, maybe next year or 2008, but I simply can’t afford a $600 item right now especially with Christmas right around the corner.

Anyway… don’t expect me to give any personal updates via phone… you’ll just have to wait till I get back for that. Airtime is $1.50 / minute; quite a steep fee for a chitchat in the woods. Besides… um… I’m trying to get away from you people for a little while. Thats why I’m going hiking in the first place!!!

I uploaded a new video to YouTube. I’m hoping that maybe this one will get better results. Although the audio says that the receive light cuts out every 15 seconds, after watching the video it is clear that the light cuts out about every 7 seconds. (receive light is 3rd from right)

Whats this mean? Well… it means that after every seven seconds the connection lags for 2-3 seconds. Imagine watching a DVD and pressing the pause button every 7 seconds for the entire movie. Thats what my games look like, what my streaming audio sounds like, and what my download speed looks like.

UPDATE: Updated information can be found on my Newwave News post

I’ve decided that my French is going to waste and think it’s time I start learning it again. I’ve got nothing but time at work, might as well make the best of it. So I’ve found some resources on the internet that I hope will help me in my quest. I’m also thinking about learning Russian as well, but I think that starting off with something I have some knowledge about would probably be the best way to go.

I’m simply tired of this extra weight. Call it laziness, call it whatever you like, the simple fact of the matter is that I’m tired of weighing as much as I do. I’m almost 50 lbs more than I was 2 years ago, and that is simply unacceptable. My mood swings, I’m lethargic all day, my clothes don’t fit, and I simply don’t want to be like this any more.

So, in an attempt to work myself up to getting in shape again, I’ve decided to lay it all out on the table. For the past few months I’ve complained more and more about not being the weight I’d like to be. However, I’ve not done anything about it in over 6 months; I haven’t been to the gym, haven’t watched what I was eating, and haven’t even stepped on a scale simply cause I didn’t want to be reminded that I was letting it get out of control. Well… I stepped on the scale today; 221.5 lbs! Yea… I said it, now it’s time to change it.

I’ve decided that I’m simply not going to lose weight by doing one of those crash diets. In addition, I’m not so sure that the carb diet I was on 2 years ago even helped, not as much as the exercise and watching what I was eating did. I guess the first step to any life changing event is to realize that one has a problem.

I have a problem.

Whew… that wasn’t as hard as I thought. Now comes the hard part thought. In realizing that I have a problem, I must figure out a solution for myself.

No Crash Diets! Set Attainable Goals! Quit Putting It Off Till Tomorrow! Realize This ISN’T Going To Happen Overnight!

First, I have realized is the fact that exercise isn’t simply a gym thing. I can exercise at home anytime I want. I don’t have to hit the treadmill or free weights. I’ve decided to do pushups and situps before every shower I take. Either I’m going to lose weight, or I’ll become stinky by avoiding showers.

Second, A portion is NOT 2 plates of food. A portion of ANYTHING is probably going to be about the size of your fist. Granted, we’re not talking about chocolate, or a fistful of candy, but as far as chicken, vegies, and healthy food is concerned, a portion is about a fistful.

Third, My attainable goal: 10 lbs in 1 month. On January 13th I will be leaving for a week in the Smokies. I think this is a very attainable goal, and will give me something to push forward to. This may be a bit over the 2 lbs per week safe limit, but I don’t think that half a pound a week more is going to make that much of a difference.

I’ll start posting something here every Wednesday regarding my progress, any stumbling blocks I’ve run across, and any other comments that I can think of. Maybe doing this will help me be accountable to myself and quit putting off till tomorrow what gets heavier today.

I simply had to post this today! It’s just what I’ve been wanting. Christmas is coming up… hint hint!

More can bee seen after the jump.

As many of you may have noticed, there are quite a few new changes happening at Corridor9. Since the server upgrade, I’ve been lucky enough to implament some features I’ve been wanting for some time including the new G2 Photo image to the left in the sidebar.

Every time you visit Corridor9 you’ll be treated to a different image from various different albums in my gallery. Not all the photos in the gallery will be displayed as I’ve picked specific albums that this plugin can choose it’s images from. May this intice you to take a look at some of the other pictures that I, and others, have snapped over the course of the last 3 years.

In addition, I’d like to personally thank my parents for the equipment that has made these improvements possible.

For the last 2 years I’ve been using iTunes to manage my database of songs. I know some of you are probably wondering why I’ve chosen to go with a closed source piece of software, especially since I’m such open source proponent. Well… to be honest, iTunes is one of the best applications I’ve used for Windows. Anyway, I’m not here to debate OS vs CS, I’m simply here to state some observations I’ve had concerning the operation of 2 pieces of software.

I’ve had cable modem since it was alpha tested here in Madisonville over 5 years ago. Two years ago, I broke down and installed their Charter Security Suite (CSS) to manage security and virus protection on my laptop. It worked fairly well for a period of time, but always seemed to make my computer lag just a little bit. I was willing to live with this as it didn’t seem to be much of a problem. The actual problem was the fact that I hadn’t noticed how much my system was lagging.

For the past 2-3 months, every time I listened to my music through iTunes, the songs would lag and skip. This happened at the same point in the song every time, about 11 seconds into each song. In addition to the audio lagging, the computer would virtually freeze up for between 5 - 15 seconds during this time. Needless to say, this became quite a big problem for me as I absolutely abhor a slow computer. The clincher was when my email stated getting hosed because the maching was lagging out while I was trying to work. The thing that I really didn’t understand was the fact that it was happening to my fairly new system. Granted, my laptop is 4 years old, but it is still middle of the road for machines today with 2.2G CPU, and 1.25G Memory. Then something caught my eye.

On a hunch I opened Windows Task Manager while listening to iTunes and working in Outlook. I noticed that after every song change a process was being run, fssm32.exe, that would completely consume the CPU cycles and freeze up the machine. Could this be the rogue process that was causing my system to act like a i486?

After looking around, I found that the process actually belonged to F-Secure’s Security Suite which just so happens to be the primary program behind CSS, and it seems to lag more systems than mine.[1]

I decided to dump it and go with a competitor for a trial period since I still had the activation code and could always reinstall the Charter Product. I must say that since I’ve gotten rid of CSS, I’ve not had a single lag with my iTunes, my online gaming experience, or my Outlook.

As there are a lot of users out there who have CSS, I’m hoping that this article helps them out some with their lag issues as well. Now all I’ve got to do is clean out my music library to free up some space for music I actually listen to.

Every year it seems like Christmas is getting here faster and faster. I can hardly believe we’re already 7 days into December. Wasn’t it just two weeks ago that kids were getting dressed up in their Halloween (All Saints Day) costumes for a night out? I seem to recall just yesterday we were sitting around the dinner table having Thanksgiving turkey; it was BBQ for me though. With age 32 approaching this February, and 40 grasping at my heels, I can’t afford to have time pass this quickly! As our daily lives get lost in the shuffle of buying presents, after school activities, and work it’s no wonder we tend to forget the true meaning of Christmas. Maybe that’s why it has become so easy for retail stores to remove the word Christmas for their advertising campaigns.[1] Lets take some time out to remember why we celebrate Christmas, reflect on the meaning, and realize what CHRISTmas is all about.

Something hit me the other day that really struck a nerve about the true meaning of Christmas. We all know that Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ: God’s son sent to earth to pay for our sins. He was the one true sacrifice that could finally bridge the gap between our eternal Heavenly Father and mankind, essentially transforming all our past sins and transgressions into nothing more than “water under the bridge”. Have you thought about the intricacies of this statement though. Through Jesus we can now talk directly to God, give him praise, ask for forgiveness, pray for our loved ones, etc.

I got to thinking about this after watching the local news station last night and simply couldn’t believe some of the things that I was hearing! News about an Ohio couple who have been charged with keeping their adopted “special needs” kids in cages has been all over both world and local news for the past few weeks. To think that someone would essentially torture a child is utterly incomprehensible in and of itself, but to do this to to a child thats been placed in your care because it needs special attention and love is all but unforgivable.

What about the woman in MI who gave her injected her 12-year-old newphew with heroin, have you heard about her. No guys, I’m not making this up, it’s all in black and white. Who could even conceive of this as being a good idea? Have we deteriorated as a society to the point that this is becoming acceptable behavior?

Yea, I know what you are thinking; anyone can look across the country and find an incident that is unconscionable. For those of you on that fence we’ll look at a story that broke last night in Evansville, IN (about 40 miles away). Somehow Ransom “Ty” Vanlue thought it would be a good idea to watch porn naked with at least four, ten- and eleven-year-old female girls in the room, in addition to various other sex acts he’s committed over the past year.

But wait, I’ve saved the worst for last. Straight from CNN: Mom charged with baby’s microwave death. Yes, you read it right; she put her own baby in a microwave oven and killed it. In no way can this be attributed to an accident. That would be absolutely ludicrous. This was cold blooded murder of her newborn daughter.

Maybe this is nothing more than a rant or maybe I’m going off the deep end here, but with all the negativity in our world today I can’t help but feel that there is another meaning to Christmas that people so often forget; something that we miss when ripping the paper off our new Playstation 3, or setting up the Widescreen HDTV for the first time. It’s been said before, but it is worth mentioning again.

The reason wasn’t for religion, but for a relationship; and what we don’t often realize is the fact that the relationship isn’t just about us.

Jesus died for my sins, for your sins, and for the sins of the world but in doing so he’s also opened a way for us to approach the Father on behalf of others. You may donate to Goodwill, drop a few dollars in the Salvation Army bucket outside your local retailer, or even adopt a Tree Angel and help someone have a happy Christmas, but please remember this; above all pray. Pray for the children who can’t take care of themselves, pray that God wraps his arms around the innocent and shields them with his love, and pray that our world stops worry about who we’re going to offend by saying Merry Christmas and start worrying about who we’re going to save.

As part of the new server upgrade, I installed new sofware called Spamassassin. The purpose of this software is to catch unwanted email messages (spam) and quarantine them so they aren’t cluttering up my Inbox.

I’ve been running this less than 24 hours, but in that time I’ve already caught 74 messages. This is wonderful, as I was getting so tired of having to remove these messages manually. I’ve already lost a few valid email messages as they seem to get lost in a sea of spam.